Ex Machina Director Discusses His Next Sci-Fi Film

Ex Machina was one of the best science fiction films of the year, nay, the decade. The film also happened to be the directorial debut for screenwriter Alex Garland, who previously had written such films as 28 Days Later and Dredd. And now that he's proven he can direct, Garland is moving on to his next project: The film adaptation of Jeff Vandermeer's novel, Annihilation. The red hot director sat down with Deadline to discuss how he came to direct the new film, and here's what he had to say:

"I was cutting Ex Machina and had a particular story that I was interested in telling, and I was talking to one of the producers of Ex Machina, Scott Rudin, about it and kind of laying out what I wanted to do and what interested me about it, and he said, 'you should read this book, Annihilation,' which he had found. It was nothing to do with me. He just put it in front of me and there was a perfect kind of dovetail to something that I was interested in doing and something that existed in this book. The thing in some respects was already set up and I came onto it after the book had been found by Scott."

Great minds, apparently. Garland also talked about the prospect of directing three Annihilation films (the novel is the first in a trilogy), but revealed that he doesn't want to get ahead of himself after his experience on Dredd.

"A few years ago when I was working on Dredd I had that conceived as a trilogy, and I now think having attempted to do that, and the thing was effectively stopped from being a trilogy because it just was a disaster at the box office, I think the thing to do is focus on the film you're making, and not really think about sequels and trilogies. So, my focus is to make this film right and that's the thing that's in my horizon."

For those of you who are curious (i.e. all of you), Annihilation is about a team of scientists sent on an expedition to a mysterious land known as Area X, which has claimed the lives of all previous explorers by various and mysterious means. Natalie Portman and Gina Rodriguez are attached to star, and the film is expected to premiere in 2017 from Paramount Pictures.